Lebanese strike a blow at US-backed government

by Robert Fisk

They've done it again. The Arabs have, once more, followed democracy and voted for the wrong man.

Just as the Palestinians voted for Hamas when they were supposed to vote for the Palestinian Authority of Mahmoud Abbas, so the Christian Maronites of Lebanon appear to have voted for a man opposed to the majority government of Fouad Siniora in Beirut. Camille Khoury - with a strong vote from the Armenian Tashnak party - won by 418 votes the seat that belonged to Pierre Gemayel, murdered last November by gunmen supposedly working for the Syrian security services.

While the Maronite vote had increased against Gemayel's showing in 2005 elections, the result was a stunning blow to the American-backed government - how devastating that phrase "American-backed" has now become in the Middle East - in Lebanon and allowed Hizbollah's ally, ex-General Michel Aoun to claim that "they cannot beat me". Mr Aoun is a candidate in presidential elections later this year.

True, the voting figures showed huge support for Pierre Gemayel's father Amin - himself an ex-president- who was standing for the parliamentary seat of his murdered son. Although he was a weak and fractious leader - Amin paid a state visit to Damascus to re-cement "fraternal" ties after the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon - he proved himself a brave man in the aftermath of his son's murder, calling upon Lebanese to support the government rather than submit once more to the domination of Syria.

Khoury's score in the Metn hills above Beirut - and a 418 conquest out of 79,000 votes is hardly a crushing political victory - yet again emphasises the divisions among the Christians of Lebanon who have traditionally fought each other - rather than their more obvious enemies - throughout Lebanese history. The Crusaders fought each other in Tyre when Saladin was at the gates of the city; in 1990, Mr Aoun's own Lebanese army fought the Christian Phalangist militia while still trying to defend themselves from the Syrians. They lost both battles.

Amin's father Pierre - grandfather of the MP murdered last November - founded the Phalange in 1936 after being inspired by the Nazi Berlin Olympics. "I thought Lebanon needed some of this order," he admitted to me shortly before his death; the original Phalange dressed in brown shirts and gave the Hitler salute. But they had turned themselves into a neo-respectable right-wing party by 1982 when they were enthusiastically supported by the invading Israeli army which hoped that Amin's brother Bashir would be elected president. Alas, Bashir turned out to be less pro-Israeli than the then-defence minister, Ariel Sharon, hoped, and was himself murdered in a bomb attack shortly before his inauguration.

Old Pierre of Olympics fame is long dead - he did not even know his own age when I last spoke to him - and Amin's brother and son were both assassinated. For the government, there was one electoral light yesterday: the victory of Mohamed Itani in Beirut, a Sunni Muslim who scored 85 per cent of the vote for the seat of Walid Eido who was himself blown up by a bomb in June.

One begins to wonder, in Lebanon, whether the election results are more surprising than the means by which MPs are liquidated.

Tom Tancredo's absolutely crazy foreign policy proposal

Where is the War on Terror heading?
By Bita Ghaffari, Press TV, Tehran

Recent remarks by the US presidential hopeful Tom Tancredo have shed more light on the absolute chaos governing American politics.

The Republican long shot said last week the best way to ward off a nuclear assault on American soil is to threaten to bomb Islam's holiest sites in Mecca and Medina.

The brash assertion even sparked a reaction from the US State Department which described it as 'absolutely crazy'.

The American political leaders' loud-mouthed rhetoric has seemingly reached a zenith. Earlier Democrat candidate Barack Obama suggested he would order military strikes against terrorists holed up in Pakistani territory.

The US gunboat diplomacy replete with belligerent comments makes one wonder where this country is heading. Evidently, the US is moving in a gravely dangerous direction.

Less than a month after the September 2001 attacks in New York, the US launched massive aerial bombing and ground assaults against Afghanistan in search of Osama bin Laden whom it alleged had masterminded the 9/11 attacks.

Six years on, the US has evidently fallen short of meeting its stated goals of capturing bin Laden and destroying al-Qaeda. Although the Taliban government was toppled initially, there has been an extraordinary Taliban resurgence lately.

Afghanistan has turned into a land with fragile stability and growing violence, and a war that has taken the lives of thousands of civilians. To add insult to injury, there has been a surge in illegal poppy cultivation turning the country into the world's number one producer of opium poppy.

In March 2003, the US troops supported by UK military forces launched an invasion of Iraq in search of Weapons of Mass Destruction which never existed in the first place. What's more, the stated purpose of restoring order to Iraq has failed as evidenced by the daily bloodbath on the streets of the war-plagued country.

The world's elite and justice-seeking people have repeatedly reminded the US that it is sinking further in the quagmire of Iraq. The Bush administration is under growing domestic pressure to call back troops home, while at the same time it has to cope with the US besmirched image globally.

It is no secret that the US so-called 'War on Terror' has been a shameful defeat and this has been recurrently admitted by political analysts and leaders the world over.

The Iraq war costs will exceed $1 trillion in tax-payers' money as forecast by the US Congressional Budget Office.

Instead of stirring public anxiety through recurrent warnings that the nation is under threat of biological and nuclear assaults, the US administration could perhaps spend a fraction of that money on tightening security and assuring the public it will protect them against the alleged terrorist attacks.

In reaction to Tancredo's blatant remarks, US State Department's Spokesman Tom Casey said the Bush administration has always made it very clear that "we want to have good, positive relations with countries certainly in the Middle East and broader Muslim world.”

Upon hearing those words, one wonders if the incumbent US government speaks a different language when it talks about 'good, positive relations' with the Muslim world. How can such remarks be construed against the background of rampant carnage in Iraq and Afghanistan and the US mum on the stream of atrocities by Zionists against Palestinians?

Casey said "to suggest that an appropriate response to terrorism would be to attack sites that are holy and sacred to more than a billion people throughout the world is just absolutely crazy".

The US statesmen however have fallen short of admitting that staging a war of terror that has led to a surge in terrorism rather than curb it and has claimed 755,000 civilian lives only in Iraq is far crazier. They've failed to admit that the so-called Operation Iraqi Freedom has only brought death, poverty and sufferings - and not freedom - to the Iraqis.

Tancredo's remarks can be interpreted as an 'absolutely crazy' brainchild, whereas the US invasion of Iraq is an 'absolutely crazier' pet project viciously and tactlessly translated into action.

China threatens 'nuclear option' of dollar sales

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

The Chinese government has begun a concerted campaign of economic threats against the United States, hinting that it may liquidate its vast holding of US treasuries if Washington imposes trade sanctions to force a yuan revaluation.

Two officials at leading Communist Party bodies have given interviews in recent days warning - for the first time - that Beijing may use its $1.33 trillion (£658bn) of foreign reserves as a political weapon to counter pressure from the US Congress.

Shifts in Chinese policy are often announced through key think tanks and academies.

Described as China's "nuclear option" in the state media, such action could trigger a dollar crash at a time when the US currency is already breaking down through historic support levels.

It would also cause a spike in US bond yields, hammering the US housing market and perhaps tipping the economy into recession. It is estimated that China holds over $900bn in a mix of US bonds.

Xia Bin, finance chief at the Development Research Centre (which has cabinet rank), kicked off what now appears to be government policy with a comment last week that Beijing's foreign reserves should be used as a "bargaining chip" in talks with the US.

"Of course, China doesn't want any undesirable phenomenon in the global financial order," he added.

He Fan, an official at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, went even further today, letting it be known that Beijing had the power to set off a dollar collapse if it choose to do so.

"China has accumulated a large sum of US dollars. Such a big sum, of which a considerable portion is in US treasury bonds, contributes a great deal to maintaining the position of the dollar as a reserve currency. Russia, Switzerland, and several other countries have reduced the their dollar holdings.

"China is unlikely to follow suit as long as the yuan's exchange rate is stable against the dollar. The Chinese central bank will be forced to sell dollars once the yuan appreciated dramatically, which might lead to a mass depreciation of the dollar," he told China Daily.

The threats play into the presidential electoral campaign of Hillary Clinton, who has called for restrictive legislation to prevent America being "held hostage to economic decicions being made in Beijing, Shanghai, or Tokyo".

She said foreign control over 44pc of the US national debt had left America acutely vulnerable.

Simon Derrick, a currency strategist at the Bank of New York Mellon, said the comments were a message to the US Senate as Capitol Hill prepares legislation for the Autumn session.

"The words are alarming and unambiguous. This carries a clear political threat and could have very serious consequences at a time when the credit markets are already afraid of contagion from the subprime troubles," he said.

A bill drafted by a group of US senators, and backed by the Senate Finance Committee, calls for trade tariffs against Chinese goods as retaliation for alleged currency manipulation.

The yuan has appreciated 9pc against the dollar over the last two years under a crawling peg but it has failed to halt the rise of China's trade surplus, which reached $26.9bn in June.

Henry Paulson, the US Tresury Secretary, said any such sanctions would undermine American authority and "could trigger a global cycle of protectionist legislation".

Mr Paulson is a China expert from his days as head of Goldman Sachs. He has opted for a softer form of diplomacy, but appeared to win few concession from Beijing on a unscheduled trip to China last week aimed at calming the waters.

(also check out the Telegraph Blog's discussion)

Why Oblivion Looms for Abbas

On Tony Karon's excellent blog Mark Perry offers 10 reasons why Hamas, rather than Abu Mazen and his U.S. backers will prevail in the struggle for Palestinian hearts and minds. The Islamists today represent the Palestinian mainstream, while Fatah is broken from top to bottom. Even more importantly, Abbas is increasingly isolated within his own organization, most of whose grassroots and mid-level leadership want nothing to do with the U.S. schemes on which Abbas has staked his future. By Halloween, expect Abbas to be either back in a unity government with Hamas, or else having departed the scene

By Mark Perry

In the summer of 1997 I found myself seated in the office of Yasser Arafat in Gaza. I had known Arafat for many years, and was a welcome visitor. Being an American and a friend gave me privileges. Others weighed their words, but I was constrained by no such requirement. So as he thumbed through a stack of papers, I pleaded clemency for a friend who had been under house arrest in Gaza for the better part of a year. The man, a prominent security official, had ordered Palestinian security forces to fire on a Hamas demonstration the summer before and Arafat, enraged, had ordered him home. “He made a mistake,” I said. “It’s time to bring him back.” Arafat ignored me.

There was a long moment of silence as Arafat’s aides eyed each other in discomfort. Arafat motioned to one of them and handed him a paper. This was typical of him. You could spend hours with the man in silence. He continued to pretend he hadn’t heard, so I plunged on. “The man is dedicated,” I said. Arafat stopped, his eyes widening, but he still refused to look at me. I waited many moments and pleaded my case again. “He’s a good man.” Finally, he spoke, but he bit off each word, making his point. “This is not your concern.” And he was silent again. “I think that it is,” I said. “He is a friend of mine.” Arafat was suddenly exasperated and locked me in his gaze, to emphasize his point: “He crossed a line.”

Those of us who know and understand something of Palestinian society were saddened by June’s Gaza troubles — the flickering YouTube films of Palestinian gunmen being dragged willy-nilly through the streets of the Strip seemed a talisman of lines crossed so many times they no longer existed. Palestinians have fought each other before — most notably in the Palestinian Civil War that raged in northern Lebanon in 1983 — but nothing like this. Palestinians themselves seemed to draw back, even recoil, from the violence. “Both sides made mistakes,” Hamas official Usamah Hamdan told me in Beirut in late June and there was sadness in his voice. “We are sorry for that.”

In the wake of these troubles, Palestinian President Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) cut ties with Hamas, declared an emergency government, suspended the workings of the Palestinian Legislative Council, arrested dozens of Hamas legislative members, clamped down on anti-government protests, purged critics in his own Fatah movement, and announced he would begin immediate talks with the Olmert government. The U.S reciprocated: it urged Israel to release hundreds of millions of dollars in tax monies, said it would work towards the creation of a Palestinian state, pressured Israel to ease travel restrictions in the West Bank, awarded the Abu Mazen government tens of millions of dollars in economic and security aid, urged Arab nations to support Abu Mazen’s political program, called on the EU to take similar actions, dispatched a team of experts to assess Palestinian needs, called for an international conference to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and conducted high-level talks with Arab nations to make certain their support for these programs was assured. The actions were breathtaking in their scope. They provided, for the first time in nearly a decade, the prospect for a political resolution of the daunting Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

And they have absolutely no prospect of success.

Instead, Abu Mazen will fail to solidify his position as President of the Palestinian Authority; the American program to support him will fail; there will be no international conference; and, within the next sixty to ninety days — and almost certainly by the end of the year — Abu Mazen and his colleagues will either be forced into exile or will take steps to reconstitute the national unity government that they have spent the last 60 days destroying.

And here’s why:

1. Palestinian society is not divided

Palestinian society is more united than it has been in years, in spite of what we see on our televisions or read in the American press. The “Gaza coup” was not launched in Gaza, but in Ramallah — and the forces that brought instability to the Strip were funded and armed by the United States. They did not represent Fatah or even a majority in Fatah, but rather a small minority of Fatah radicals. The vast majority of mainline forces in Fatah, and even a significant number in the Fatah Central Committee did not support the arming of the Preventive Security Services. The leader of the PSS, Mohammad Dahlan is now in exile and his opponents are calling for his arrest. The Palestinian people know this. They know their vote was overturned by Abu Mazen and the United States, and they resent it.

2. Hamas remains popular, and it is gaining strength

It is true, there have been some dips in the popularity of the movement in some areas, but the losses are not significant. And, remember, there is a tendency in the U.S. to consistently underestimate Hamas’s popularity, which I attribute to:

– a disbelief that Palestinians could support such an organization

– a belief in U.S.-funded Palestinian polling numbers

– the reputed secular nature of Palestinian society

– a tendency to overlook the traditional strength of Hamas during periods of confrontation, and

– the impact of the economic embargo.

My own (admittedly unscientific), belief is that Hamas’s strength is likely to grow. The movement’s base of support has widened significantly — from about 9 percent in the late 1980s to about 25 to 30 percent now, numbers that match up well to any well-established Western political party. While its parliamentary victory in January of 2006 was due largely to Fatah’s poor reputation, Hamas has not repeated Fatah’s mistakes: despite the clear temptations of power, it has provided as good a government as its resources have allowed — no stain of impropriety has touched its senior leadership. This remains its most significant achievement.

3. Hamas represents mainstream Palestinian society

Palestinian society is not secular, liberal, progressive and western. It is Arab, traditional, conservative and Muslim. Mahmoud Abbas, Salam Fayad, Saeb Erakat and Yasser Abed Rabbo are fine people — and they are friends of mine — but they do not represent mainstream Palestinian society. Hamas does. The election of Hamas and its continued strength is not a setback for Palestinian society, but a reflection of its growth. My own Hamiltonian tendencies are humbled. It is possible to understand America by visiting Boston, but I wouldn’t recommend it — any more than I would recommend that an American believe that Hanan Ashrawi is typically Palestinian. Americans aren’t governed from Nantucket but from Natchez, and Palestinians aren’t governed from Ramallah, but from Jubalya — and wishing it so doesn’t make it so. That Fatah was defeated is not simply a comment on their corruption, but on their inability to speak for the people of Palestine. It is for this that Hamas is likely to grow and prosper.

4. Hamas is is not innately or irrevocably wedded to violence

Hamas stood for an election and won. We decided to reverse the verdict of a democratic process, not them. There is certainly debate inside of Hamas on the efficacy of continuing the movement’s involvement in electoral politics. The loss of some popular support, the reversion to violence in Gaza, the inability of the movement to break the international boycott, emerging divisions inside Hamas itself, and the closing off of political options have sparked this internal debate. But I doubt that Hamas will abandon its current strategy in favor of violent confrontation, either with Fatah or with Israel. The view from Gaza may seem dark, perhaps the view is even darker in Damascus. But there is another side to the ledger, and it is as significant: Balancing Hamas’s strengths are Fatah’s continuing weaknesses — and those cannot be reversed with a simple infusion of our money.

5. From top to bottom, Fatah is broken

Fatah is weak, aging, corrupt, disorganized, and even more divided than Hamas; it is funded exclusively through outside sources; it lacks a clear political program and political vision; its leadership is out-of-touch, conference-bound, tethered to a past era; it is dependent for its survival on the United States and Israel (a fact of which Palestinian society is well aware, at the expense of Fatah’s credibility) it is at war with its own younger cadre (which are abandoning the movement). Its militant Tanzim grassroots are growing in strength, but are alienated from Fatah’s leadership, disenchanted with its corruption and, perhaps most importantly, is cooperating with Hamas. The Fatah grassroots is pushing hard, just now, for the long-delayed General Conference to reform the organization. Abu Mazen can throw Hamas legislators in jail — it will be much more difficult to throw members of his own party in jail, which is why …

The political battle being waged in the West Bank now is being waged inside of Fatah

Abu Mazen’s power has been significantly eroded inside of his own organization. The recent meeting of the committee called to make an assessment of the Gaza troubles repudiated Abu Mazen’s appointees: Mohammad Dahlan, Rashid Abu Shabak and Tawfik Tarawi. Abu Mazen is within one vote of losing his Fatah power base. His closest aides (Salam Fayad, Saeb Erakat, Rafiq Husseini, Yasser Abed Rabbo) count for nothing in Fatah, because they have no vote in the organization. Abu Mazen’s plea to the Central Committee last Tuesday, that “my aides have told me my actions are legal,” brought laughter even from his closest supporters. Former Prime Minister Abu Alaa has refused to support him and Hani al-Hassan has denounced him. In response someone shot up Hassan’s house. He laughs: “They made sure I wasn’t here,” he told me. And the former national security advisor, Jabril Rajoub has called for Mohammad Dahlan’s arrest. Abu Mazen’s response has been to say he will hold national elections — but without allowing Hamas to run. And our president has conferred his blessing on this, calling Abu Mazen’s government “legitimate.” Truly, truly, truly, we are a light in the darkness, a city on a hill.

7. Abu Mazen is increasingly isolated

The non-payment of governmental salaries to Hamas members in the West Bank is causing deep disenchantment because it cuts across family and tribal lines. So it is that one brother, a Fatah member, is paid while another (a Hamas member) is not. Salam Fayad has thereby proven to be a good bean counter, but not much of a politician. He has set family against family, brother against brother. And doing that is deeply resented in the West Bank. So too, the security services are in a posture of near-revolt over the policy of continuing arrests of anti-Abu Mazen partisans. Posters have begun to appear in the West Bank, styling Abu Mazen a Palestinian Pinochet — or worse, an “Abu Musa” (the man whom Syrian President Hafez Assad sent to kill Arafat in Lebanon). The posters are being designed by Fatah, not Hamas. Do we really believe that the Palestinian police will continue to follow Abbas’s orders: to arrest Hamas activists because they do not meet the conditions of the Quartet? Because Hamas does not “recognize Israel?”

8. The united front of the U.S.-Israel and the Arab regimes is no match for Hamas in the battle for Palestinian support

Indeed, the much-vaunted united front being built by the U.S. against Hamas is something of a myth: The Egyptians and Saudis have quietly repudiated the U.S. program to overthrow Hamas, and instead have urged Fatah and Hamas to reconcile. Colin Powell has called for talks with the Hamas leadership, while Israel’s support for Abu Mazen remains predictably indifferent. (They’re no dummies – the Israelis, too, will end up talking to Hamas is my bet.) There are 542 roadblocks in the West Bank — the same number will be there tomorrow and next week and next month. Tell me I’m wrong. Israel has returned tax money collected for the Palestinians to the Palestinians, but not all of it — and it has trickled in. Do we really, really believe that Israel will suddenly rise up as one and say that they intend to endorse UN Resolutions 242 and 338? Or are they now quietly laughing into their tea and shaking their heads: we’re going to support Abu Mazen? We’re going to send him guns? We’re going to conduct talks with him and calculate that he will be able to produce competent and uncorrupt administration — and one that has the support of his people? Or are they will to see what we have failed: that the last time there was an election in Palestine Mr. Abu Mazen’s party lost. The U.S. program in Iraq is in a shambles, calm and stability are returning to Gaza, questions about the American program for Palestine are being raised in Washington. This is not a time for sudden political movement or a shift in strategy, it is a time for political calculation. Hamas knows it. Israel knows it. Egypt knows it. Saudi Arabia knows it. The only person who doesn’t seem to know it is George Bush.

9. Hamas’s reign in Gaza undermines the propaganda of its foes

Some U.S. politicians and Abu Mazen’s more alarmist allies like to paint the Hamas administration in Gaza as a kind of pro-Iranian Islamic State, but this hardly stands up to scrutiny. There is no enforcement of the veil or other conservative Islamic social laws, no Sharia council, no compulsion to attend the mosque. Stability has returned to Gaza. People are obeying the law, and feel secure. This is not a lesson lost on either Egypt or the Israelis. Which would they rather have — civil conflict or civil order?

10. Abu Mazen has crossed the line

Several years after my mild confrontation with Mr. Arafat in Gaza, I met with him at his headquarters in Ramallah. It was a bright early April morning and quite memorable for its beauty: just one day after the resolution of the Siege of the Church of the Nativity. Those in the church had, the day before, been sent out of the church to Europe — away from their families and into an involuntary exile. Their departure had been emotional: they had walked out of the church as their families, on the rooftops of Bethlehem, cheered and wept.

The next day I traveled very early to Ramallah to see Arafat to talk to him about the siege. When I arrived I was ushered into his upstairs office. It was just after dawn. I was exhausted, but I found Arafat in a good mood and open to my banter. “I think you crossed a line,” I told him. It was something I would not have dared to say at any other time, but he was smiling at me and so he nodded, as if humoring me. “Oh? he asked. “And what line would that be.” I had him, finally, and so I recited the rule, liturgically: “Palestinians do not send other Palestinians into exile,” I said. He looked at me and nodded and then looked down, suddenly sad. “Yes,” he said. “But I have another line,” and he reflected: “Palestinians do not send other Palestinians to Israeli jails.”

There are lines. Palestinians do not send other Palestinians into exile; Palestinians do not shoot other Palestinians; Palestinians do not betray other Palestinians, Palestinians do not resolve their political differences by gunfire, Palestinians do not collaborate with their enemies, do not betray their own people, Palestinians are not traitors to their own cause, Palestinians do not send Palestinians to Israeli jails. And at one time or another each of these lines has been crossed. But at no time, ever, has any Palestinian ever renounced the one principle — the one true commandment that has motivated every Palestinian patriot from Arafat to Abu Musa to Abu Nidal: that the Palestinian people are indivisible; that they cannot be divided.

Until now. By turning his back on the Palestinians in Gaza, but even actively seeking their impoverishment in the United Nations (as he did, shamefully, on Friday, when his diplomats blocked efforts to seek a Security Council statement on the humanitarian situation there), Abu Mazen has set out to divide the Palestinian nation, to set it against itself. And that line, in the end, cannot be crossed. And the fact that Abu Mazen has crossed it will, in the hearts and minds of the Palestinian people, make all the difference. There is only one Palestine and now, Abu Mazen is not a part of it.

Iran Makes Mideast’s Best Supercomputer (and it runs on Linux!)

TEHRAN, Aug. 6 --Iran has manufactured the Middle East’s most powerful supercomputer at the Research Center for Ultra High-Speed Processing of Amir Kabir University of Technology.
A researcher with the project’s team, Bahman Javadi, said the project is the result of two years of research, Fars reported.
“The supercomputer has 216 Aptron processing units with two gigahertz frequency that utilizes cluster technology and functions in a parallel manner. This computer has 56 gigabyte memory with a storage capacity of 5,800 gigabyte,“ he said.
Javadi noted that the supercomputer will be used for weather forecast in Iran’s Meteorological Organization and has the processing capacity of 860 billion actions per second.
“According to world trade regulations, supercomputers that perform more than 190 billion acts per second are regarded as strategic products and their sale is subject to international sanctions,“ he said.
Javadi pointed out that Iran has joined the few countries that have access to the technology for manufacturing such a supercomputer.
Noting that the supercomputer uses Linux operating system, he further said the software for monitoring and controlling the system was also designed by researchers of the center.
“Several application software products, including MMS and ARPS used for forecasting weather, have also been installed on the supercomputer,“ he said.
“The Research Center of Ultra High-Speed Processing of Amir Kabir University of Technology gained access to the technology for manufacturing cluster supercomputers after 15 years.“
Javadi pointed out that Iran’s first supercomputer was produced in the center in 2001 and a supercomputer was installed at Iranian Space Organization in 2003 for processing satellite pictures.

Interview that Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for legal and international affairs, Abbas Araghchi

By Gareth Smyth, Financial Times

The following is the transcript of an interview that Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister for legal and international affairs, Abbas Araghchi, has given to UK's Financial Times.

Financial Times: What is the big obstacle to Iran and the US talking to each other?

Abbas Araghchi: We had no plan to do so, although the Americans were obviously interested … We didn't think the theatrical behavior would help with this very complicated situation, and the difficult relationship between the two sides … We need understanding of each other, and understanding of the situation in Iraq. If the US wants to solve their problems in Iraq, they should understand their mistakes so far.

Their invasion was a disaster - let there not be a double disaster with a disastrous withdrawal. If they have the good will to solve problems, they should introduce an exist strategy, and then there can be a face-saving withdrawal.

FT: So Iraq is the first step to wider progress?

AA: We want to bring stability back to Iraq - this is very important. We are interested in the peace and security of Iraq, its unity, its territorial integrity, that it be at peace with its neighbors. We consider peace and security in Iraq [to be] our own peace and security.

It is very important for us to see that the Iraqi government and Prime Minister [Nouri] Maliki are successful, because …the only alternative is absolute chaos, maybe a civil war or the breaking of Iraq into different pieces.

Iran would be the first to benefit from the return of peace and security in Iraq.

FT: And peace and security cannot come without a US withdrawal from Iraq?

AA: This is what we understand. Iraq is suffering a vicious cycle. There are foreign forces who have occupied Iraq, and justify their presence on the pretext of the 'war on terror' and terrorists who claim they are fighting occupiers …Each is justified by the other.

The only solution is to end occupation, and this means a well-planned strategy.

In his speech at Sharm el-Sheikh Mr. [Manouchehr] Mottaki [the Iranian foreign minister] tried to give some guiding principles … First of all, the government of Iraq should be supported and strengthened, it needs to be helped, and not only the government, but the whole political establishment, which is the result of a democratic process …

Second, the government should be given more responsibility - political, economic and especially in security matters. The security file should be given to the Iraqi government. It is not acceptable, not useful, for the Americans to continue to manage security by themselves ….The Iraqi government should have authority and responsibility, and then it can be held accountable.

Thirdly, enough facilities, equipment and training should be given to the Iraqi armed forces and police, to enable them to fulfill their responsibilities ….

Fourthly, help for reconstruction in Iraq. Without improving the lives of ordinary Iraqis, we cannot expect the return of peace and security. Why, for example, in Baghdad, is there only two or three hours of electricity a day? Why is there not enough safe water, or enough schools?

An exit strategy should include these principles, these guidelines. Together Iraq's neighboring countries and foreign forces, we can help the Iraqi government and have a clear prospect for the future, a bright horizon … Iran is completely ready to help in that direction. There should be good will on the other side, and a road-map and sense of co-operation.

FT: The US would say they agree with these principles. But their disagreement would be over their withdrawal. They do not seem to want to accept a timetable for a withdrawal.

AA: This is why I'm talking about an exit strategy. They think it's premature to talk about a timetable, they are afraid of 'premature' withdrawal. But this should not mean we have nothing, and continue like this … We should clear the prospects and talk about co-operation, and America should encourage the same approach by other countries in the region. To some extent, this happened in Sharm el-Sheikh. We saw more support for Iraq's government and its political establishment. The final statement … has expressed and emphasized full support for Prime Minister Maliki, and the government and the political establishment. That was good.

We can continue our efforts, to build more support, to remove the concerns of some other parties in the region, to convince some Sunni groups and their supporters that in a democratic process they can achieve what they want …If they are not happy, there are mechanisms in the Constitution they can use.

We need good-will first of all, and the Americans should stop accusing others for mistakes they have made themselves. It is useless to accuse Iran of supporting foreign fighters or sending arms. Why should we do that? We have the same interests in Iraq? Why should we undermine the Iraqi government?
Terrorist groups are against Iran as well. Al-Qaeda, for example, is a sworn enemy of Iran …. We are the first victim of terrorism ourselves.

FT: You said the US was afraid of withdrawal. What do you think they are afraid of?

AA: You should ask them.

I think there should be no place for being afraid of their withdrawal. Yes, immediate withdrawal could lead to chaos, civil war, could turn Iraq into a failed state. This is a fact. No-one is asking for immediate withdrawal of foreign forces from Iraq. But there should be a plan … if we continue like this, there will be more excuses for terrorists …

I don't think they are afraid of withdrawal, they just don't know how to do it … The whole world, the region, expect the Americans, just as they had a military plan for the invasion, to have a political plan for withdrawal from Iraq. This is a reasonable, legitimate expectation, and if they fail to introduce an exit strategy, there will be a double failure.

Their invasion was a disaster - let there not be a double disaster with a withdrawal … If they have the good will to solve problems, then there can be a face-saving withdrawal.

FT: There was a report in al-Hayat [London-based, Saudi-owned Arabic newspaper] the other day that Iran was unhappy that the Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem, had met Condoleezza Rice …

AA: Syria has its own interests and policies. We are neither encouraging nor discouraging them from meeting Americans or anybody else. When they met Ms Rice at Sharm el-Sheikh, they briefed us on what happened between the two ministers. We had no objection.

FT: Would you say the Syrians agree with the process you have outlined for the future of Iraq?

AA: They have their own concerns and interests, each country does. We advise the Americans to acknowledge these …. In the case of Iran, we had eight years of war [with Iraq, 1980-8], and we have suffered from the dictator in Iraq [Saddam Hussein]… We have a long boundary with Iraq, and a shared history … We share religion and culture.

So we have legitimate concerns and interests. The same is true for other neighbors - Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey. There is no way other than including all these countries' concerns.

This is why we insisted the meeting of Iran's neighboring countries should stay as it is. We don't think the addition of more countries to this institution can help … the P5 or G8. We have no problems with these countries, but we should keep this institution of neighboring countries so as not to complicate the decision-making process …

On reconstruction, we can have a large number of countries, as we did at Sharm el-Sheikh on the first day for the International Compact on Iraq. We had something about 70 countries. Yes, they can express their wishes to help Iraq, Iraq's reconstruction, their pledges for help, loans, grants, things like that … but when it comes to the question of security, to the question of political issues, I don't know how countries that are thousands of kilometers far from Iraq can help.

So we shouldn't complicate the process. We should keep the neighboring countries' meeting as it is. In Sharm el-Sheikh, more and more neighbors understood the points we have said before: that we need closer contact with each other … we should have our own [foreign] ministerial meetings for neighboring countries, and [also meetings of] ministers of interior …

FT: How do you assess the Saudi role in Iraq, particularly their relationship with some Sunni militants?

AA: The Saudis are trying to be constructive. We acknowledge that they also have their own concerns, and I think we should find a way to accommodate the concerns of all countries in the region. With the Saudis, we have always good and close consultation, and they know our concerns, and we try and develop understanding among each other - on the question of Iraq, on the question of Lebanon we have had good consultations. On other issues - security issues in the Persian Gulf region - we are in close contact….

We hope that a positive climate can be developed among all countries in the region, based on which we can develop a security arrangement for the region in which there would be no need for foreign forces. We think that the security of the region should be provided by the countries of the same region - I'm talking about the Persian Gulf.

FT: Do you think Saudi Arabia - and all significant forces in Saudi Arabia - are reconciled to a Shia-led Iraq?

AA: I think we should all accept a democratic process in Iraq.... We should respect the will of Iraqis … because otherwise we would have fighting and clashes between different tribes, sects, between Shias and Sunnis, between Kurds and others. There is one solution - to have a democratic structure for Iraq, and there have been good achievements so far: a general assembly, a constitution, then a constitutional-based government … so we have to admire these achievements, we shouldn't try to undermine them....

Of course there is always place for the improvement. Iraq has a federal system now, and it should remain as it is. We shouldn't consider it a Shia-led government. It is a federal one, and the political structure is based on proportional representation. The prime minister is Shia, the president is a Kurd, and the head of parliament is a Sunni. It's a very good combination of different parties in Iraq, we should respect this.

If we think there is something wrong with that, we have to go through democratic processes to correct it …

FT: What do you know about the Americans' relationship with Pejak, the so-called Iranian wing of the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party)?

AA: We have some information, and some indication, that contrary to what the Americans claim, there has been some contact with some terrorist groups.
This is why I talked about good will at the beginning. One of the bad policies of the United States is this double standard towards terrorism, to divide terrorists into good and bad terrorists. This is the source of so many problems.

You named one of those groups. We may name others as well - the MKO [the Mujahedin-e Khalq], for example, which is based in Iraq under the protection of the Americans. They are terrorists, recognized by the European Union, by the United States, and they should be sent to trial.

FT: Where do you think [Massoud] Rajavi [the MKO leader] is?

AA: I don't know. He is either in Iraq or somewhere in western countries, I don't know, I have no information, no intelligence. But the kind of MKO terrorists we know are either in Iraq or in European countries, and in the US This is very bad. We see that they are doing whatever they want in European countries, in Britain, in France, in Germany. Of course, under the cover of different names, but everyone knows they are the same group.

They killed Americans before the Revolution in Iran, they have killed so many Iranian officials after the Revolution, Iranian people, and they are proud of that. Then they went to Iraq, helping Saddam Hussein in fighting with Iran during the war, then fighting with Shias and Kurds during the 1991 uprising, giving Saddam Hussein intelligence and every assistance. Now they are in Iraq. A good number of them have already been transferred to Europe, but some foot-soldiers - worthless in the current situation - have remained in camp Ashraf.
We have tried hard - from a humanitarian point of view - to help those people in Ashraf camp. We have given them an amnesty if they return to Iran. A group - 500 all together - has already returned to Iran, and they have joined their families. The Red Cross has their records, they know they have started a new life …

If they come back to Iran, they are welcomed by their families … If they have committed a crime inside Iran, they should be sent to trial, but we know that most of them have done nothing ….

FT: Do the Americans have relationships with other groups that have carried out violent acts in Iran - Baluchi groups, or Arab groups in Ahvaz?

AA: Well, we have some indications. Our intelligence ministry has said they have some indications of contacts between both American and British soldiers in Iraq with this kind of group …

FT: Have you made any estimation of the amount of arms that have come in Iran from Iraq since the 2003 invasion?

AA: I don't have any figures, but the number is high, as you can see by reading the page of incidents [crime page] of Iranian newspapers … in almost all of them where a person has killed someone, he says he bought the gun from Iraq …it was so cheap, I got one.

So we have a problem with the number of individuals who buy guns from Iraq.. Terrorist groups as well as criminals see Iraq as an opportunity.

FT: The Americans accuse Iran of supplying weapons to insurgents in Iraq, particular kinds of weapons [amour-piercing explosive devices]. Why don't you counter that by pointing out the amount of weapons coming the other way?

AA: Their claim that Iran is sending arms to Iraq is baseless. They have never been able to present any acceptable documents, valid proof that Iran has sent arms to Iraq. Even some of their own officials have questioned publicly the validity of these claims. The only things they have presented so far is that some arms and munitions they have found in Iraq are manufactured in Iran. This cannot prove anything, it cannot prove the involvement of any agency from Iran.

If governments were to be held responsible for the use by terrorists of all the weapons manufactured in their country, the Americans should be blamed first.

They haven't been able to provide any valid proof - and there is also no reason. Why should we help them? Why should we arm them? We are suffering from the same problem, terrorism.

Both us and other groups [countries] such as Turkey. This is why in the statement of the Sharm el-Sheikh meeting [paragraph 4], it is said that the transit of arms to and from Iraq should be stopped. This recognizes that there is a problem for neighboring countries, which arms are coming into their countries from Iraq as well.

FT: Again on good will. What is the latest on the 'Arbil Five' the five Iranians arrested in Arbil in January?

AA: We have just received a good will sign, that the Americans have [agreed to] let their families meet them. This will be done perhaps by the end of this Iranian week. We arranged that with the help of the Red Cross.

They have been able to send letters to their families, and even made telephone calls .. in at least one case I know …

There are also some indications by Iraqi officials they have received promises they might be released soon. Certainly, their release is very important to us, and it would be considered a good step forward. Their abduction is against international conventions, it is against the sovereignty of the Iraqi government, it undermines the government …. And very importantly, it discourages other countries from having diplomatic missions in Iraq, something the Iraqis are encouraging…

FT: How do you explain the confusion over whether the Iranian 'consulate' in Arbil was or was not a consulate?

AA: We have passed from that question, it is already solved. Our mission, our office in Arbil has been there for 15-16 years, after 1991. It has worked with the permission of Kurdish officials there. It didn't have the condition of other diplomatic missions because of the special environment in Kurdistan, but even that problem has been solved. Just a couple of months before the American invasion of our consulate [in January …unintelligible…] were exchanged between the two countries, between the Iraqi and Iranian foreign ministers, and they accepted the diplomatic status of our office in Arbil.

FT: So the Iraqi government did accept this was a consulate?

AA: Yes. In the meeting in Baghdad, in March this year, when I raised the issue in the meeting, and Mr. [Zilmay] Khalilzad [then the US ambassador in Iraq CHECK] claimed they were not diplomats, Mr. [Hoshyar] Zebari [the Iraqi foreign minister] intervened himself and said no, the Iraqi government recognized their status as diplomats, and the Iranians consulate in Arbil as an official diplomatic mission.

The Iraqis have asked the Americans to show good will, and tell us they insist …on their release.

It was a very unreasonable act by the Americans. Why did they abduct them? What is it good for?

FT: They say the five were involved in organizing insurgents.

AA: We already talked about that. The whole idea is unreasonable. Why should we do that? Why should we undermine a government in Iraq that we support more than anybody else?

FT: They would say you want to encourage the Americans to withdraw.

AA: This is not a good excuse. There are other ways, we are always encouraging the Americans to do that. They know themselves that they should withdraw.

FT: Can I ask you about the American who disappeared in Kish, Mr. Levinson? Do you have information about him, whether he has left Iran?

AA: We have heard rumors, but we have no information about him, and this is what our intelligence ministry and other relevant organizations have said. We have tried hard to help investigate the case in Kish, and we have let the Americans know we are trying our best to find the gentleman, if he is in Iran, but we haven't found anything yet.

FT: He was in Iran, wasn't he?

AA: Apparently, he has been in Iran.

FT: Well, then you would know [from entry-exit information] whether he has left.

AA: We have no information.

FT: Turning to the nuclear program, are the talks with Javier Solana, the European Union foreign policy chief, going anywhere? They seem to be turning in a big circle.

AA:They Mr. Solana, and Ali Larijani, Iran's top security official] met in Ankara and decided to continue. That itself was good news. Some new ideas and initiatives were raised in their meeting, and they preferred to have more talks, more thinking on those ideas, and to meet each other at a later time.

The western side should find a more logical and reasonable way to deal with this issue. They tried [UN Security Council] resolutions, and it proved unhelpful. There are two paths, two options - confrontation and co-operation. Each one has its own requirements.

If they prefer confrontation, okay. Let's go together. But they cannot sanction us, adopt resolutions against us, add pressure on us, and expect co-operation from us. The two options cannot go side by side - there is either co-operation or confrontation.

What has been the result of three [UN] Security Council resolutions, two introducing sanctions? Iran has quickened the pace of its peaceful activities, and reduced its co-operation with the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency], of course within the framework of the NPT and Safeguards, so [there is] less transparency, and less confidence and trust. Because the core of this problem is trust, and trust is a two-way road. They don't trust us, we don't trust them either. We cannot solve this problem unless we build confidence and trust between the two sides. Resolutions have not helped, they have worsened the case…

They can continue. They could adopt a new resolution, more sanctions, and they know what would be Iran's reaction. We have no way to react but to reduce our co-operation with the agency, we may decide to go out of our relations ….

FT: Which relations?

AA: Safeguards, and international rules and regulations, because our people would ask: “They are sanctioning you, what is the use of co-operating?”

FT: Are you talking about leaving the NPT?

AA: Well, we are not talking about this. But you know there are serious debates, in the parliament, among some political people … what is the good of remaining in the NPT? …When you cannot enjoy the benefits of NPT, why have you remained there? We hope not to find ourselves in a position where we cannot answer that question.

Another resolution, harsher reactions by Iran, which would lead to another resolution and more sanctions. There is action and reaction. Step by step, we would reach the point where we have few options on the table … This can go on, but the result is escalation of the crisis whose end result will be a 'lose-lose' situation.

There are other ways. The line of co-operation is not closed. What we want is only our rights, and the materialization of our rights… We are confident about the peaceful nature of our program and we are prepared to share that confidence. They cannot ask us to give up our rights, but they can ask us for clarification, for asking their questions about diversion.

They have concerns that the Iranian program might be diverted into non-peaceful purposes in the future. Let's find a solution. Why are they sanctioning us because they think maybe in the future, Iran would go for military purposes ..? They have doubts about our intentions, they have found nothing in the ground. So they are punishing us for crimes we have not committed! This is not fair, the resolutions are not fair.

They want to be ensured about the peaceful nature of our program. Okay, let's work together … let's concentrate on the question of non-diversion, which can be a good subject for negotiations …There are different ideas and initiatives [on] how we can ensure the peaceful nature of Iran's program in the future. A good one is the idea of consortium, we may go for consortium based on the proposal of our president in the General Assembly of the United Nations in 2005. If they want to be assured about our program, okay, they can be a part of it, they can be present in a joint venture …

There might be other ideas, how we can have enough guarantees that Iran's program would remain peaceful. We are prepared to talk about that, to negotiate that. They should not ask to give up our rights, to stop our program, but they are entitled to ask anything else.

But we will pay the price for [continuing] our nuclear program. We know it may be a costly way, but this is an important juncture in our history.
The British went to the UN Security Council over Iran's nationalization of oil [in 1951] - saying it was a threat to world peace…

The Iranian people resisted …and paid a price. There was a [US engineered] coup [in 1953] …and 26 years of dictatorship [under Shah Mohammad Reza, overthrown in 1979]. But if we had not paid that price, our people would still be buying Iranian oil from BP.

Ron Paul Warns of White House Using 'Gulf of Tonkin' Incident to Launch Iran War

Larouche reports that Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, the Congressman from the 14th CD of Texas, would not back down in an interview today with Murdoch's Fox TV News, about the fact that the White House would use a "Gulf of Tonkin" incident to launch war against Iran. This is also the view of Lyndon LaRouche, who has identified this danger, calling it "Gulf of Tonkin II."

In a straightforward interview on Fox News, today, Paul made mincemeat of one of Fox's female provocateurs who was peddling the White House slander that Paul is accusing the White House of planning a fake terrorist incident to launch that war. Paul just laid out the truth--the White House used 9/11 to attack Iraq. There were no weapons of mass destruction, and there was no connection of Iraq to 9/11, but the White House took advantage of the tragedy to do what it had long planned--war on Iraq and regime change.

The same White House will do the same thing against Iran given the "opportunity" to react to an incident, which could come in many ways--an accident, or a terrorist action by some other force, e.g. Osama Bin Laden, that would be blamed on Iran.

The point is that the White House is intent on that war, says Paul, and has planned on it, as it did the Iraq war.

Afghan president counters US rhetoric on Iranian role

AFP - WASHINGTON: Afghan President Hamid Karzai, a key US ally, contradicted US assessments of the threat posed by Iran and insisted in an interview aired Sunday that Tehran played a beneficial role in his region. "So far, Iran has been a helper and a solution," Karzai told CNN on the eve of a visit here Sunday to meet with President George W. Bush for talks on the deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan.

"Iran has been a supporter of Afghanistan, in the peace process that we have and the fight against terror, and the fight against narcotics in Afghanistan," said Karzai, who became president with US backing in 2002.

His remarks differed markedly from the US stance, which sees Iran as a major menace that bankrolls terrorists, supplies arms to insurgents in Afghanistan and Iraq, and seeks to develop nuclear weapons.

The position was reiterated on Sunday by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as she defended the decision to sell tens of billions of dollars in arms to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states to thwart Iran.

"I don't think anybody doubts that Iran constitutes a major challenge, security challenge, to our friends, our allies, and therefore to our interests in the Gulf region," Rice said.

But asked about US suggestions that Iranian weaponry was being funneled into Afghanistan, where Taliban fundamentalists were mounting a reinvigorated insurgency six years after their ouster, Karzai was noncommittal.

"We have had reports of the kind you just mentioned. We are looking into these reports," he said in the interview conducted Saturday.

He added that Afghanistan and Iran had "very, very good, very, very close relations, thanks in part also to an understanding of the US in this regard."

"We will continue to have good relations with Iran. We will continue to resolve issues, if there are any, to arise," Karzai said.

Also interviewed on CNN, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates responded to Karzai's comments by offering that Iran was "playing both sides of the street in Afghanistan."

"I think they're doing some things to help the Afghan government," said Gates, who just returned from a Mideast tour, adding: "I think they're also doing things to help the Taliban, including providing weapons."

Karzai also said that he would do everything to help free 21 South Korean missionaries short of actions that would encourage more hostage-taking.

Asked whether he would negotiate with the Taliban kidnappers to secure the release of the Koreans, Karzai said: "We will try everything to have them released safely and in security.

"We will do everything other than encouraging hostage-taking and terrorism to have them released," he added.

Karzai said the kidnappers, who seized the 23 South Korean church aid workers on July 19 and have killed two of them to try to force the government to release Taliban prisoners, mainly foreigners.

Opposition Wins Lebanon By-Election

BEIRUT, Aug 6--Lebanon's Western-backed ruling majority was dealt a blow on Monday in by-elections that split the country's Christian camp in two and boosted the opposition ahead of a presidential poll.

Official results showed the candidate representing opposition leader Michel Aoun winning by a slim margin of 418 votes over former president Amin Gemayel, who was backed by the ruling Western-backed coalition.

Camille Khoury won 39,534 votes as against 39,116 for Gemayel.

The outcome of the vote was important as it showed which way the country's divided Christian community was leaning ahead of a presidential election scheduled for next month. Lebanon's president is traditionally a Maronite Christian who is chosen by parliament.

The by-elections on Sunday were to replace two murdered MPs, the latest in a spate of politically linked killings that have rocked the country since the 2005 assassination of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri.

Gemayel was vying to replace his son Pierre, a Christian cabinet member and lawmaker who was shot dead last November. In Beirut, the vote was to replace Walid Eido, a Sunni Muslim lawmaker who was killed in a car bomb in June.

Eido's seat was easily won by pro-government candidate Mohamad Amin Itani.

Several Lebanese newspapers on Monday said that although Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement emerged the winner in the weekend poll, the party had nonetheless been weakened politically as it only clinched a narrow victory.

The movement of Aoun, a declared presidential candidate, garnered most of the Christian vote in 2005 legislative polls, but his popularity has waned since he forged a shock alliance last year with the Iran- and Syria-backed Shiite militant group Hezbollah.

"A difference of 418 votes: a fake victory," blared a headline in the pro-government French daily L'Orient Le Jour.

The paper said that had it not been for the support of the Armenian community in one district, where Gemayel alleged vote-rigging, Aoun's party would have been trampled in the polls.

But the opposition newspaper Al-Akhbar said that although Aoun won by a slim margin, the results put to rest claims by the ruling majority that he no longer represented the Christian community.

"Even though his victory was not overwhelming, Aoun came out the winner," it said. "He has answered to those who pretend that he is no longer the leader of the Christian community."

Simon Abi Ramia, an adviser to Aoun, said that Sunday's vote proved that he still enjoyed widespread support especially when one considers that he had beaten "a historical figure from the Metn" region, a stronghold of Gemayel's Phalange Party.

"A victory is a victory whether it be by one or 20,000 votes," he said.

But Faysal Itani, of the Beirut-based Carnegie Middle East Centre think tank, said Aoun had nonetheless been politically weakened in the by-elections.

"He's been saying for a couple of years now: 'how can you ignore me when I represent 70 percent of Lebanon's Christians?'" Itani told reporters. "This election shows that he does not."

Samir Frangieh, a deputy from the ruling majority, said the vote had dashed Aoun's presidential hopes.

"He is now out of competition," Frangieh said.

Parliament's challenge now is to elect a new president to succeed incumbent Emile Lahoud by a November 25 deadline.

While the majority controls enough seats to elect a president, it needs the opposition to take part for the two-thirds quorum required for parliament to convene.

The by-elections came amid heightened political and security tensions in the country as a deadly showdown in a northern refugee camp continued to rage after 11 weeks.

The Other War

by Cindy Sheehan

I was sitting behind the stage at Union Square the other day when a young woman with a cameraman in tow approached me and asked me if she could ask me a “question.” Seldom when I am approached to answer “a” question does it turn out to be just one question and this person looked like she was about 14 years old.

“Sure,” I answered her. With eyes brimming with tears, this was her question, prefaced by a comment:”I am a soldier and I served in Afghanistan, what do you have to say to the troops who are over there?”

I don’t know what told me this soldier was not “pro-war,” she had on jeans and a non-descript striped shirt with a collar. Neither she, nor her cameraman had any anti-war paraphernalia. I think it was her watery eyes that gave her away as being anti-war. I couldn’t be sure though because it has become certain groups and individuals’ life’s missions to harass me.

My heart is always with our troops no matter what these “pro-murder, pro-destruction, pro-Bush” people think. My own son was a soldier and, although he didn’t have any kind of killer instinct and a fear of having to kill someone when he went to Iraq, he was a good soldier and he loved his Army family and proved that love by dying to save some of them. I think most of our troops are in Iraq and Afghanistan to support their “buddies” as a young soldier wrote to me:

“I did not know your son, but we lived on the same little FOB, and I recognize his name, and face. I was infantry, and he must have been in 182 since I don’t recognize him from the other INF. companies.

I hear many people ask why are we dying for nothing. NOTHING, could be further from the truth. We do not fight, and die for a man. We do not fight, and die for a cause, or corporation. We fight, and die for each other, nothing more. I will not have it said in my presence that your son died for nothing. He died for me, he died for his brothers, and sisters in arms. That is why we all fight. That is why we all die.”

I understand that kind of camaraderie and love. There are many people whom I would die for and I would have traded places with Casey in a heartbeat if given the choice. What I don’t understand is a cowardly commander-in-chief and his vice-war lord sending our brave troops to die for each other. Even the troops know there is no “noble cause” other than the bond that glues them together. I have met hundreds of vets from the Iraq/Afghanistan mistakes on down to the Korean War mistake and they all tell me that they would have taken Casey’s place, too.

When the young vet confronted me with the camera in Union Square the other day, I could only speak from my heart. I answered her:

“Oh, honey. It must seem like the peace movement in the US has forgotten about our troops in Afghanistan and the Afghani people. I know that I don’t talk about that conflict enough, although I think that it is morally wrong, too. I know that our soldiers are dying and being harmed there, too. As much as the media doesn’t cover what’s happening in Iraq, it pays even less attention to Afghanistan. However, the peace movement is not united on Afghanistan, because many people think that it is a “good war.” I believe no such thing and I promise you that I will be more vigilant about exposing that war crime, too.”

Then I hugged her and whispered in her ear: “Your buddies deserve honor and attention, too and I am so sorry for what you have had to go through!”

She replied to me: “I am going to send this to my friends in Afghanistan and I just want to let you know that we are all behind you.” That quick exchange had an enormous impact on me and I will fulfill my promise to that young woman.

Why did our country and a criminal international coalition invade Afghanistan? Is it for a strategic placement of oil pipelines? Was it to install a former oil executive as a US controlled puppet president? Was it because Osama bin Laden may have been in the country (and as many accuse, allowed to escape at Tora Bora?) We know for a fact that Osama was armed, trained and supported by the US when he was part of the mujahadin that fought against the USSR, that caused the collapse of the Soviet Union along with its rampant militarism. We know that bin Forgotten is still at large and that, in the initial invasion of Afghanistan, more innocent civilians were killed than on 9-11.

We also know for a fact that poppy production is at historically profitable levels and the Taliban is extorting bribe money from the growers to finance its
insurgency against the US. When the Taliban controlled the country opium production was illegal and the penalties were harsh. Women are still oppressed and besides a Coca-Cola bottling plant and war-profiteering not much has been accomplished.

According to www.icasualties.org, 421 US troops have been killed and 6,213 have been wounded in Afghanistan. One of the fatalities was John Torres who was apparently murdered by a fellow soldier because John was exposing the active drug trade on his base. The true circumstances of Pat Tillman’s murder were covered up in the highest echelons of BushCo and we may never know the truth or the profound implications of that crime. Both these incidents demonstrate that not everybody fighting wars are watching out for their buddies, and besides, may be of the paid mercenary persuasion.

Most of our troops are courageous and only trying to survive under unconscionable conditions and I want to publicly honor our young people who have had their lives stolen by the war machine in Afghanistan and send my heartfelt condolences to their families. Not even the evil empire of BushCo can corrupt or diminish our children’s forced sacrifices.

Our troops stationed in Afghanistan need to know that the US peace movement supports them by working to get them home, too.

Note:
For people who have been asking, my formal announcement as a candidate against Nancy Pelosi has been pushed back to August 9th due to logistical concerns. www.CindyForCongress.org should be going live soon with more details and a way to donate to my campaign.

Israel’s Jewish problem in Tehran

So why hasn’t Iran started by wiping its own Jews off the map?

By Jonathan Cook

08/03/07 "ICH" -- - -- Iran is the new Nazi Germany and its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the new Hitler. Or so Israeli officials have been declaring for months as they and their American allies try to persuade the doubters in Washington that an attack on Tehran is essential. And if the latest media reports are to be trusted, it looks like they may again be winning the battle for hearts and minds: Vice-President Dick Cheney is said to be diverting the White House back on track to launch a military strike.

Earlier this year Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s opposition leader and the man who appears to be styling himself scaremonger-in-chief, told us: “It’s 1938 and Iran is Germany. And Iran is racing to arm itself with atomic bombs.” Of Ahmadinejad, he said: “He is preparing another Holocaust for the Jewish state.”

A few weeks ago, as Israel’s military intelligence claimed -- as it has been doing regularly since the early 1990s -- that Iran is only a year or so away from the “point of no return” on developing a nuclear warhead, Netanyahu was at it again. “Iran could be the first undeterrable nuclear power,” he warned, adding: “This is a Jewish problem like Hitler was a Jewish problem … The future of the Jewish people depends on the future of Israel.”

But Netanyahu has been far from alone in making extravagant claims about a looming genocide from Iran. Israel’s new president, Shimon Peres, has compared an Iranian nuclear bomb to a “flying concentration camp.” And the prime minister, Ehud Olmert, told a German newspaper last year: “[Ahmadinejad] speaks as Hitler did in his time of the extermination of the entire Jewish nation.”

There is an interesting problem with selling the “Iran as Nazi Germany” line. If Ahmadinejad really is Hitler, ready to commit genocide against Israel’s Jews as soon as he can get his hands on a nuclear weapon, why are some 25,000 Jews living peacefully in Iran and more than reluctant to leave despite repeated enticements from Israel and American Jews?

What is the basis for Israel’s dire forecasts -- the ideological scaffolding being erected, presumably, to justify an attack on Iran? Helpfully, as George Bush defended his Iraq policies last month, he reminded us yet again of the menace Iran supposedly poses: it is “threatening to wipe Israel off the map”.

This myth has been endlessly recycled since a translating error was made of a speech Ahmadinejad delivered nearly two years ago. Farsi experts have verified that the Iranian president, far from threatening to destroy Israel, was quoting from an earlier speech by the late Ayatollah Khomeini in which he reassured supporters of the Palestinians that “the Zionist regime in Jerusalem” would “vanish from the page of time”.

He was not threatening to exterminate Jews or even Israel. He was comparing Israel’s occupation of the Palestinians with other illegitimate systems of rule whose time had passed, including the Shahs who once ruled Iran, apartheid South Africa and the Soviet empire. Nonetheless, this erroneous translation has survived and prospered because Israel and her supporters have exploited it for their own crude propaganda purposes.

In the meantime, the 25,000-strong Iranian Jewish community is the largest in the Middle East outside Israel and traces its roots back 3,000 years. As one of several non-Muslim minorities in Iran, Jews there suffer discrimination, but they are certainly no worse off than the one million Palestinian citizens of Israel -- and far better off than Palestinians under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza.

Iranian Jews have little influence on decision-making and are not allowed to hold senior posts in the army or bureaucracy. But they enjoy many freedoms. They have an elected representative in parliament, they practice their religion openly in synagogues, their charities are funded by the Jewish diaspora, and they can travel freely, including to Israel. In Tehran there are six kosher butchers and about 30 synagogues. Ahmadinejad’s office recently made a donation to a Jewish hospital in Tehran.

As Ciamak Moresadegh, an Iranian Jewish leader, observed: “If you think Judaism and Zionism are one, it is like thinking Islam and the Taliban are the same, and they are not.” Iran’s leaders denounce Zionism, which they blame for fueling discrimination against the Palestinians, but they have also repeatedly avowed that they have no problem with Jews, Judaism or even the state of Israel. Ahmadinejad, caricatured as a merchant of genocide, has in fact called for ‘regime change’ -- and then only in the sense that he believes a referendum should be held of all inhabitants of Israel and the occupied territories, including refugees from war, on the nature of the government.

Despite the absence of any threat to Iran’s Jews, the Israeli media recently reported that the Israeli government has been trying to find new ways to entice Iranian Jews to Israel. The Ma’ariv newspaper pointed out that previous schemes had found few takers. There was, noted the report, “a lack of desire on the part of thousands of Iranian Jews to leave”. According to the New York-based Forward newspaper, a campaign to convince Iranian Jews to emigrate to Israel caused only 152 out of these 25,000 Jews to leave Iran between October 2005 and September 2006, and most of them were said to have emigrated for economic reasons, not political ones.

To step up these efforts -- and presumably to avoid the embarrassing incongruence of claiming an imminent second Holocaust while thousands of Jews live happily in Tehran -- Israel is now backing a move by Jewish donors to guarantee every Iranian Jewish family $60,000 to settle in Israel, in addition to a host of existing financial incentives that are offered to Jewish immigrants, including loans and cheap mortgages.

The announcement was met with scorn by the Society of Iranian Jews, which issued a statement that their national identity was not for sale. “The identity of Iranian Jews is not tradeable for any amount of money. Iranian Jews are among the most ancient Iranians. Iran’s Jews love their Iranian identity and their culture, so threats and this immature political enticement will not achieve their aim of wiping out the identity of Iranian Jews.”

However, this financial gesture may not only be unwelcome but self-fulfilling too, if past experience is the yardstick. Israel introduced a similar scheme a few years ago, when Argentina’s economy plunged into deep recession, broadcasting an offer of $20,000 to every Jew who settled in Israel. Months later the Israeli media reported a rise in anti-Semitic attacks in Argentina, only adding to the pressure on Jews there to leave. Of course, there was no mention of a possible causal connection between the attacks and Israel’s generous offer to Jews to abandon their homeland as other Argentinians sank into poverty.

But if financial enticements -- and a possible popular backlash -- fail to move Iranian Jews, there is good reason to fear that Israel may resort to other, more dubious ways of encouraging them to emigrate. That is certainly a path Israel has chosen before with other communities of Arab Jews, whom it has regarded either as a pool of potential spies and agents provocateurs to be used when needed or as “human dust”, in the words of Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben Gurion, to be recruited to Israel’s “demographic battle” against the Palestinians.

In “Operation Susannah” of 1954, for example, Israel recklessly recruited a group of Egyptian Jews to stage a series of explosions in Egypt in a bid to discourage Britain from withdrawing from the Suez Canal zone. When the plot came to light, it naturally cast a shadow of disloyalty over Egypt’s wider Jewish community. Following Israel’s invasion and occupation of Sinai two years later, the government of Gamal Abdel Nasser expelled some 25,000 Egyptian Jews and, after others were imprisoned on suspicion of spying, the rest soon left.

Even more notoriously, Israel went to greater lengths to ensure the exit of the Arab world’s largest Jewish population, in Iraq. In 1950 a series of bombs targeted on Jews in Baghdad forced a rapid exodus of some 130,000 Iraqi Jews to Israel, convinced that Arab extremists were behind the attacks. Only later did it emerge that the bombs had been planted by members of the Zionist underground, supported by the Israeli government.

Now, Iran’s Jews may find themselves treated in much the same manner -- as simple human fodder. Stories are growing of Israel exploiting the free movement between Iran and Israel enjoyed by Iranian Jews and their Israeli relatives to carry out spying operations on Iran’s nuclear programme. Such reports have come from reliable sources such as the American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, citing US government officials.

The fallout from such actions is not difficult to predict. Besieged by the US and the international community, Tehran is cracking down on dissent and minority groups, fearful that its own grip on power is shaky and that the well-publicised subversion being carried out by US and Israeli agents is likely only to be stepped up. So far most officials in Tehran have been careful to avoid suggesting that Iran’s Jews have double loyalties, as has the local Jewish community itself, both of them aware of Israel’s interests in provoking such a confrontation. But as the strains increase, and Israel’s need to prove Tehran’s genocidal intent grows ever stronger, that policy may end up being forfeited -- and with it the future of Iran’s Jews.

More important than the welfare of Iranian Jewish families, it seems, is the value of Iranian Jews as a propaganda tool in Israel’s battle to persuade the world that coexistence with the Muslim world is impossible. For those who want to engineer a clash of civilizations, the 3,000-year-old Jewish legacy in Iran is not something to be treasured, only another obstacle to war.

Jonathan Cook, a journalist based in Nazareth, Israel, is the author of Blood and Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State (Pluto Press). His website is www.jkcook.net

US spy plane hits Allawi's home

According to Iranian news reports, Iraqi sources have confirmed that an American surveillance plane has crashed into Iyad Allawi's residence.

The aircraft slammed into Allawi's house in Baghdad on Thursday. The incident comes as US support of the former Iraqi prime minister is heightening while at the moment he is the most vocal opposition to the current Iraqi government.

Allawi had told Aljazeera that he dismissed some of the US requests on Iraq and particularly on how to deal with Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Allawi became Iraq's first head of government since Saddam Hussein when the original governing council dissolved on June 1, 2004 and named him prime minister of the Iraqi Interim government.

His term ended on April 7, 2005, after the selection of Islamic Dawa Party leader Ibrahim al-Jaafari by the newly-elected transitional Iraqi National Assembly.